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Buying a home can feel like the most intense research project ever
- to make a smart buy, you’ve got to get educated about mortgages,
learn how to read a contract, do a deep dive into property condition
issues or homeowner’s associations and pay attention to what’s going on
in the economic news and the real estate market. But there’s at least
one more area wise buyers don’t neglect: neighborhood research.

We
know, at a gut level, what kind of neighborhoods we like - tree-lined
streets, convenient shops, etc. and so forth. But what specific details
should you investigate before you buy or move into an area? Here are 5
items you definitely need-to-know before you move into a neighborhood:

1. Details on Shady Dealings.
Most of us think we know which sides of the railroad tracks, so to
speak, have high crime rates and which are supposedly safe. But before
you buy a home or move into a neighborhood, it behooves you to actually
do the research and see whether or not your beliefs are accurate. Check
out the Megan’s Law databases to see where registered sex offenders may
live, especially if you have young children or other reasons to be
particularly worried. Google your address, which might pop up details such as whether your intended home has ever been a meth lab, among other things.

And,
whatever you do, don’t forget to tap into Trulia’s new Crime Maps – in a
number of metro areas (which will be constantly expanding), you can
view uber-detailed (and sometimes surprising!) crime data that is
uber-relevant to you. If you’re trying to decide between two homes in
different parts of town, you can even toggle back and forth between the
neighborhoods to compare them! For example, some neighborhoods have a
spike in car break-ins after people leave for work. Or maybe one side
of your street-to-be has a significantly higher rate of violent crimes
than the other.

That’s the kind of thing you should find out before you move in, don’tcha think?

2. How Recession-Resistant it is. Let’s
face facts: some neighborhoods, cities and states have fared better
than others over the course of the recession. An area’s proximity to
job opportunities, saturation with troubled subprime loans and the
amount of housing supply (vs. demand) all have something to do with
whether prices plummeted or have held up over the last few years.

Sometimes,
a neighborhood’s recession-proofness (or -proneness) is obvious: if
the street on which you’re house hunting is riddled with ‘For Sale’
signs (and foreclosure riders on top of them), or you know for a fact
that the home you’re buying is a short sale for which the sellers paid
double your price just 5 years ago, you might be in an area that has
been hard hit. Also, if your neighborhood has a sky-high rate of price reductions or it is much less expensive to buy than to rent a home in your area, these are other indicators that the recession might have hit your district pretty hard.

The
fact of the matter is, some of the hardest hit neighborhoods are where
the best deals are to be found, so I’m not necessarily suggesting that
you shy away from buying in such an area. But do know that the harder
hit areas might take longer to see an uptick in home values, too, so the
harder hit your neighborhood was by the real estate recession, the
longer you should plan on staying put before you buy, to make sure you
don’t end up needing to sell and stuck in an upside-down home. While a 5
to 7 year plan might make sense in an area where the real estate market
has been pretty robust over the last few years, you might want to be
okay with planning to hold your home upwards of 10 years before buying
in a foreclosure-riddled area (and you might also want to make
absolutely sure you’re very happy with the deal you’re getting).

On
the flip side, the more recession-resistant your area has been, the
more likely you are to encounter sellers with less flexibility on
pricing or even, gasp!, multiple offers!

3. The Neighborhood’s Flavor.
Is the area you’re considering a hot spot for outdoor adventures and
family events at the park, or chi chi restaurants and wine tastings at
the museum? Find out by pulling up some listings on Trulia and scrolling
down the see how others who have lived in the area have rated and
reviewed it.

Also, take a look at NabeWise
- it’s only available for about 10 large cities right now, but it’s got
a super useful function where you can search by city and what’s
important to you (like being in a trendy neighborhood, or one that’s got
ample public transportation) and it’ll surface neighborhoods which
might be a good fit for your values.Neighborhoods are even ranked based
on prestige and how beautiful residents are (the latter of which I find
fascinating - but more as a measure of where the raters’ heads are at
than of anything you must include in your neighborhood fit equation!).

4. Where are the hot spots? Before
you buy or move into an area, equip yourself with a knowledge of where
all the stores, farmer’s markets, parks, restaurants and other hot spots
your family will want to use are located vis-a-vis your home-to-be.
(Hint: your local real estate agent is a fabulous source for this kind
of information - they are especially gifted at knowing where the good
food and shopping is!) Your Trulia Mobile App will
alert you to nearby haunts that have Yelp! reviews; also, your
neighbors-to-be can be a great source of this sort of information -
knock on doors and ask for their recommendations.

It
also makes sense to search the web for the various sorts of things your
family is into, and your new neighborhood’s name. An internet search
for running trails in my neighborhood is how I found out my house was
just a couple of blocks away from a largely hidden lake we now visit
regularly. Then, drive around and see what you can see - or find
someone to drive for you. Once, when I moved to a new town, I marched
myself onto a city bus, sat behind the driver, told them I was new in
town and asked them to point out things they thought I needed to know.
I got an hour long tour through three neighboring towns - for $1.25!

5. What the neighborhood looks and feels like at different times of day/different days of the week. Have
you ever visited a Sunday afternoon open house when the sun was
shining, birds were singing, and charming neighborhood rugrats were
rolling their hoops up the street? (Okay - that was a century or two
ago, but you get the gist.) Then, you come back a couple of weeks later
for your inspections at dusk and find those same rugrats (or their
parents!) spraying graffiti all over “your” garage, the neighbors’
underpants flapping on the line in the front yard and the other
neighbors’ music blaring? File that under disappointing.

The
nature of a neighborhoods changes - sometimes dramatically - before and
after the sun goes down. Also, if you visit a home during the week or
when it’s cold and rainy out, the street will undoubtedly be busier and
noisier - more reflective of the extremes you should be aware of - on
the weekend or when the weather is grand. So, before you buy, go see
the place in sunlight and after dark, during the week and on the
weekend. And, again, there’s nothing wrong with knocking on the
neighbors’ doors, telling them you’re thinking of buying, and seeing
what kind of insider information you can glean from them!